Tag: immigration

culture, Immgration, Life3 Comments

The State of American Immigration

Mark Cathcart

The state of American immigration is misunderstood, misapplied and subject to a lot of hysteria. To me it continues to amaze that a country where you can drive for hours east and south in Colorado, west in Texas, and pass nothing. Absolutely nothing. I’m sure there are other US States where you can do this, I’ve just not driven through them. America, with a number of Western countries, not least mine, the UK, have created massive disturbances and in some cases, wars persist as a direct result of our actions. Yet we have largely uninhabited geographic areas as big as … Continue reading The State of American Immigration

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Why do some States have more Representatives?

Mark Cathcart

As a quick follow-on from yesterdays post, thanks for the emails and messages on linked-in. I was listening to the USCIS MP3 for the 100 Interview questions last night and found this answer, among others pretty imprecise. This is a single question extract from the actual USCIS MP3. The question this raises is, which States have more representatives but a smaller population, and why? Obviouly this also hightlights the importance of the U.S. Census which measures the population. Also, google searching for the questions is a great way to find the confusing litany of websites out there to help immigrants … Continue reading Why do some States have more Representatives?

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The US Citizenship conundrum

Mark Cathcart

It’s become a constant, “why aren’t they citizens?” Questions over immigration eventually always end up with a debate, almost always unproductive, sometimes angry about why people who live in the US have not become US Citizens. It’s my view, that people who pose these questions, do so mostly because they’ve never had to apply themselves. They have no idea how expensive the process is, how long it takes, and for many how difficult it is. I get a weekly email, it contains a 1-byte GIF, which is used for tracking. When the mail reader loads the .gif file via http, … Continue reading The US Citizenship conundrum

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There is no British history without the history of empire

Mark Cathcart

Off the back of the British government “Winrush” scandal, The right honorable, David Lammy MP, made the following speech. It exposes the myth of immigration for many, many millions of people. The same is true for the racial divide here in the USA. They had no choice, they didn’t want to go somewhere, they are all here, because “we” were all there. While it’s not an identical situation here in America, as much of the current immigration furore is about immigrants in the last 5o-years. There is no British history without the history of empire. I am here because you were … Continue reading There is no British history without the history of empire

Life, Politics, politics, religion2 Comments

Sweden, Refugees and that Trump thing

Mark Cathcart

Even before the Trump administration, America has taken pitifully few refugees and asylum seekers from the crisis it started in the post 9/11 era. This is especially true when you look at it’s geographical size, and financial strength. At 20x the size of Sweden, and over 18x the GDP, America has taken just 10% of the refugees Sweden. By now anyone paying attention will have heard about the debacle of Trumps speech where he attempted to justify his Executive Order on Immigration by pointing to “what happened in Sweden last night”. If you have not, you can read the whole … Continue reading Sweden, Refugees and that Trump thing

Life1 Comment

US Government over performing

Mark Cathcart

Yesterday I received a letter congratulating me on becoming a permanent resident and telling me I’d receive my “green card” within the next 3-weeks. Much to my surprise, it showed up in the mail today, along with a small envelope that said “We recommend use of this envelope to protect your new card and to prevent wireless communication with it.” So the first thing I did was to scan it with my NFC enabled Google Android phone, didn’t work. Anyway cheers to the USCIS Texas processing center for getting my card out so quickly. I’ve already printed USCIS Form N-400 … Continue reading US Government over performing

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Constraint Relief

Mark Cathcart

I have this whole disatation I’ve been working on about the evils of the “bell curve” as a performance measure for technical people. It’s mostly about constraint relief. Today, one of the biggest constraints in my life has been lifted. I received the following in the mail from the US Government Dept. of Homeland Security. The key part says “This is to notify you that your application for permanent residence has been approved. It is with great pleasure that we welcome you to permanent resident status in the United States.” – It’s been a long time coming, longer than I’ve known … Continue reading Constraint Relief